Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Graduate School Barbie (TM)

Every Graduate School Barbie comes with these fun filled features guaranteed to delight and entertain for hours: Grad School Barbie comes out of the box with a big grin on her face that turns into a frown after 2 weeks or her first advisor meeting (whichever comes first). She also has adorable black circles under her delightfully bloodshot eyes.

Comes with two outfits: a grubby pair of blue jeans and 5 year old gap T-shirt, and a floppy pair of gray sweatpants with a matching "I hate my life" T-shirt. Grad School Barbie talks! Just press the button on her left hand and hear her say such upbeat grad school phrases like, "Yes, Professor, It'll be done by tomorrow", "I'd love to rewrite" and "Why didn't I just get a job, I could have been making $40,000 a year by now if I had just started working with a Bachelor's. But noooooo, I chose to further my education, I wish somebody would drop a bomb on the school so that I'd have an excuse to stop working on my degree that's sucking every last drop of life force out of my withered and degraded excuse for a soul..." (9V lithium batteries sold separately)

Grad School Barbie is anatomically correct to teach kids about the exciting changes that come with pursuing a higher education. Removable panels on Barbie's head and torso allow you to watch as her cerebellum fries to a crispy brown, her heart race 150 beats per minute, and her stomach lining gradually dissolve into nothing. Deluxe Barbie comes with specially designed eye ducts. Just add a little water, and watch Grad School Barbie burst into tears at random intervals. Fun for the whole family!

Grad School Barbie's Medicine Cabinet comes in Fabulous (pepto-bismal) pink and contains Barbie sized bottles of Advil, St. Johns Wort, Zantac, and your choice of three fun anti-anxiety drugs! (Barbie Medicine Cabinet not available without a prescription).

Grad School Barbie's Computer Workstation. Comes with miniature obsolete PC (in pink of course), rickety desk, and over a dozen miniature Mountain Dew cans to decorate your workstation with (Mountain Dew deposit not included in price. Tech support sold separately).

And Grad School Barbie is not alone! Order now and you'll get two of Barbie's great friends! GRADUATE ADVISOR KEN, Barbie's mentor and advisor in her quest for knowledge, higher education and decreased self esteem.

Grad Advisor Ken (tm) comes with a supply of red pens and a permanent frown. Press the button to hear Grad Advisor Ken deliver such wisdom to Barbie as "I need an update on your progress," "I don't think you're ready to defend yet", and "This is no where near ready for publication."

Buy 3 or more dolls, and you can have Barbie's Thesis Committee! (Palm Pilot and tenure sold separately.)

REAL JOB SKIPPER, When Barbie needs to talk, she knows that she can always count on her good friend Real Job Skipper (tm), who got a job after getting her bachelor degree. Press the button to hear Real Job Skipper say, "Sometimes I wish I went for my masters degree" and "Work is so hard! I had to work a half an hour of overtime!" Real Job Skipper's Work Wardrobe and Savings account sold separately.

WARNING: Do not place Grad Student Barbie and Real Job Skipper too close to each other, as there have been several cases of children leaving the room and coming back to find Barbie's hands mysteriously fused to Skipper's throat.

Okay, okay... this is both slightly dramatic and severely pessimistic, I know. We can't always be a ray of sunshine! Let me vent, people!

Note from 12/7/11: As I wrote in my comments from last February, I didn't make this up myself. I was procrastinating one day and Googled "grad school jokes" to humor myself. Life's simple pleasures. I loved that one so much that I had to share :). Thanks for the compliment of thinking I was capable of that, though. The Barbie is actually a 50th Anniversary edition of her, because all 50 year olds are very wrinkly and have gray hair (haha).I just searched "ugly Barbie," and that's what came up! I never meant to claim that I wrote this. I have attempted to find the original source but cannot as it is wide spread across the internet by hundreds of people who have not sourced it. I am sorry to the original author! I am only including this disclaimer because of some Negative Nancy's out there. I posted this for my friends and fellow graduate slaves, not you, Nancy. If you don't have anything nice to say, just don't say it. That's learned in Kindergarten and not grad school, though. Thank you to everyone else with the fun comments! I have just finished grad school officially and am about to enter the working world!! There is an end in sight, I promise!! Until then, good luck to you!

Oh, Chel... you of great faith. No, I didn't make it up myself... I was procrastinating one day and Googled "grad school jokes" to humor myself. Life's simple pleasures. I loved that one so much that I had to share :). Thanks for the compliment of thinking I was capable of that, though. The Barbie is actually a 50th Anniversary edition of her, because all 50 year olds are very wrinkly and have gray hair (haha).I just searched "ugly Barbie," and that's what came up! My secrets are revealed.

Trust me - if you ever decide to go for your doctorate, you will look back on your master's level education years and marvel at how easy they felt, compared to the increased demand and intensity required at the doctoral level. In that case, gray-haired Barbie will be thinning-haired Barbie and will devise ways to use student loan checks for wrinkle fillers and other dermatological advances to undo the damage that grad school has wreaked by marching across her face.

Dear, God!!! I laughed so hard I started crying!!! This is the funniest thing I have ever read...EVER...and SO TRUE!!! From one Grad School Barbie to another...THANK YOU, for the laughs, as I venture into another sleepless paper-writing night!!! ;D

Wow - this is becoming quite popular! I did not write it, see above post for how I found it. I've tried searching for an original author to cite, but the joke is pretty common on the web, so I'm not sure who is the mastermind behind this!

I just read this to my OT second year problem based learning small group class. HILARIOUS! People not in OT school just do not know how much work this is...the volume is incredible, week after week. College was a cinch!! Hope you're well on your way to graduation!

It gets better, i promise!!! I finished my doctorate of physical therapy about two and half years ago, and people who haven't gone through it just don't understand. BUT there is an end in sight- i work with a bunch of OTs who all made it through- see the light at the end of the tunnel! this is hilarious, thanks for posting :)

I've been on both sides... Grad student followed by working desk-job woman... And they both suck! The only perk to working is the paycheck and the baked goods people bring to work. That's it! Oh life, isn't it funny?? This Barbie made me laugh hysterically. Thanks for sharing!

I just happened to run across this blog and omg! you couldn't have done this any better. LMAO! It's the funniest thing I've ever read and anyone in graduate school, and hell even at an undergraduate level, can truly appreciate "Graduate School Barbie". Thanks for making my day with this LOL!!

hey.......guys......you forget, the objective of extending your educational experience is to avoid the real world as long as possible....to revel in the joys of collegelife........real life is tougher than college......God, i wish i had the stress of three courses instead of the next day, tomorrow, normal stuff of a job i have done for 30 years.................

So true, so true...I've been done with my Ph.D. for nearly 10 years, but I still remember when a professor in my department--at the end of my first year told me not to take prelims early or I'd fail and I ran into the hallway and cried hysterically for 20 minutes...just couldn't take it after a horrible and stressful year... and to the previous post...grad school IS real life...except with more pressure! We all had the same problems and "reality" as everybody else...we have bills, jobs(usually multiple part-time, low paid ones) and responsibilities. The myth that attending grad school is somehow escaping or avoiding the "real world" is completely ridiculous.

Hilarious and a bit too close to the truth! I am a grad student in Hamilton, ON (Canada). I found this on my friends FB page and laughed my head off, and promptly shared it. Thanks - gave me great comfort in knowing that I'm not alone :) haha...

"the objective of extending your educational experience is to avoid the real world as long as possible"Um....no. No it is not. Graduate school is not something you do for fun. Usually you do it because you HAVE to in order to pursue your chosen career.

"real life is tougher than college......God, i wish i had the stress of three courses instead of the next day, tomorrow, normal stuff of a job i have done for 30 years"I'm just guessing . . . but I don't think you have been to graduate school. I am taking 15 credits, which comes with at LEAST 30 hours of research, reading, and writing per week, plus I have 3 (8-10 hour) days of in the field practicum, 10 hours plus of commuting in my car each week- and somehow have to find time to run a household and keep my marriage from falling apart due to the fact that graduate school is sucking me dry. Oh did I mention that I occasionally like to sleep.My days in the corporate world were SO much simpler.

Em,I have a one-woman show that I've been touring called DIRTY BARBIE AND OTHER GIRLHOOD TALES. People have been discovering your blog post and sending it to me. As a former grad school girl with a similar stomach lining and propensity to tears and parodying Barbie, I thank you.

This is the funniest thing I've read in a long time (so funny, because it is so true!)....I am an almost 50 year old grad student, pursuing a Master's in Public Health, and a Master's in Nursing (as a nurse midwife)...The wardrobe, the gray hair, the bags...all accurate! Thanks for the laugh! I needed it (end of term at both schools!).

Yes, yes, yes! This is me - once young (feeling) and idealistic. Now old (looking) and disillusioned. As a 54 year-old grad student, it's nice to know I am not alone."Why don't we just quit?" is my question.

This is funny but it is so true. www.phdcomics.com has always been my source of laughing at myself and the things we all sacrafice for the credibility of being a scholar. If my spelling is off, my apologies for having limited sleep within the past 3 days of finals

This is funny... but Grad School Barbie might want to consider that she chose to go to grad school. It was a voluntary act, wasn't it? GSB is also free to leave her program and compete for one of those "real" jobs she romanticises about. It is, I repeat, funny and true to experience, so don't think I'm a crank.

But yeah, this is all so precisely real that it hurt (while i laughed) even ten years after i finished the PhD. Grad school really is one of those things that you have to experience to understand, which, as is usually the case, means that all y’all out there who don’t get the joke probably shouldn’t want to understand it.

WV: amberi: Either (a) the name of Grad School Barbie’s bubbly, vacuous friend who married an investment banker and complains all day about how hard it is to find good help these days, while telling GSB she’s jealous of how carefree GSB’s life must be, or (b) the name of the generic form of Ambien that GSB is considering adding to her medicine chest, if she can only afford the co-pay.

Oh, man, is that hilarious! And slightly depressing because it's so true. Thank you for this! It is too perfect in every single way. Except that my own customized Grad School Barbie would be making her life change in her 30s, leaving her $45,000/yr job only to go into massive debt (She has negative money now!). Why didn't I just keep working?? Alas. It'll all be worth it in the end, right? ;)

Oh thank you! I have a paper due in a few hours and needed the laugh...otherwise I'd be tempted to play in traffic. You (or the original author) forgot that Grad School Barbie also comes with a magically shrinking and expanding waistline thanks to hours sitting in a chair reading/writing and the tendency for forgetting to eat.

When I am working full-time (plus) I long for the "freedom" of being back in school instead of punching the time clock and putting up with the stupid corporate politics; when I am in grad school (two masters so far & now working on the Phud), I long for the "freedom" of a steady paycheck and not having to spend my evenings and weekends reading or researching and writing, not to mention putting up with the stupid academic politics. TANSTAAFL!

While thoroughly entertaining, a 'tenure-track' Barbie is needed. Frankly, I'd give anything to go BACK to graduate school after being on the tenure track for awhile. What little of my stomach lining was still in place when I took the job is definitely gone.

To all my fellow Grad School Barbies: I know you are working full time, although it is HIGHLY not recommended, and you have an internship that requires 20 hours per week, and in order to attend class you work horribly long days and write papers all night, and you are raising children and attempting to keep some sort of overt attachment with family and friends, I understand and so does this post. I'm on a seven month count down. And can no longer afford the gas to get to class! By the way, I highly recommend fish oil and vitamin B and D. And wine. And to all the negative Nancy's, you will need us someday and we will be able to help you.

I NEEDED this laugh! I'm working three part time RN jobs which equal more than one FT, attending full time school for family nurse practitioner + clinicals, raising a family, caring for parents, etc... I can't believe Barbie is going through the same thing! From one grad school Barbie to all of the rest of you - We can do this!

This made my day, maybe even year.. heck, maybe even last 4 years! Closest thing I've seen to explaining the unexplainable experience that is grad school... And to all the grad school beauties out there temporarily being sucked dry - You go girls! I still have hope we can puff up after! Thanks so much "Ceej and Em" (mostly of th Em factor I assume...) for sharing. ESPECIALLY that you have survived and escaped! All the best in your new endeavors!! You've spread a lot of joy. Many thanks.

Just sent it to my daughter who sent her thesis for review and is defending on Monday and to a friend who just received her doctorate with a side case of PTSD. LOVE this. Thank you. The best thing for me was realizing my daughter is totally normal - Just like Barbie!

Thanks for the laughs . . . and the memories. This cuts very close to home on multiple levels. I returned to graduate school in my late 30s and just retired after an academic career that includes critiques of the race and gender "problematics" (grad school term) of Barbie dolls. Grad school's tough, but when the bags under your eyes aren't just from all-nighters and the silver hairs on your head aren't just highlights, you may look back on grad school as the time of your life. So hang on and kick Barbie to the curb.

I love the comment above about undergrads being BRATZ dolls. I wouldn't mind being a graduate student if it weren't for the bratty, point-grubbing undergraduates who slither into office hours to argue back every last point on a paper or exam.

This is awesome! It was forwarded to and - even thought it's the night before finals are due - I read it. Thanks for the needed comic relief! One day (3.5 years from now) Grad School will indeed be over (unless of course I go for a second doctorate...)

I'm in an OT grad program now and this is so true! Even my professors say that grad school was the hardest/busiest time of their lives, so it makes me feel a little better that it gets easier. Also, congrats on your recent graduation! You are free!!

Some of us masochist Barbie's are actually working to make life easier for the rest of the world. And you sure as hell don't make a six-figure salary doing that. Apparently those of us who experienced the tortures of grad school (while working with dying people in the Global South trying to make a difference) aren't entitled to rant once in a while, but you can bitch about us? But me.

Oh yeah, and as for the whole grad school being "fun" thing, I taught full-time during my master's and PhD, held down two other jobs, worked for the non-profit organization of dying people my work was benefiting, AND did my research and published. SUPERFUN!! I totally just did that grad school thing for 'kicks', I'm one lucky bastard with all that great debt I've heaped on too!

Thank you SO much for posting this! Before I read this, I was writing in a cafe (on yet ANOTHER Saturday night), and was considering throwing my coffee at the next smiling person who passed my table. Getting 3-4 hours of sleep a night makes one think about disturbing things . . . and as PhD student in Clinical Psychology, this is all the more concerning :)

Thanks so much for sharing this. I just started grad school and was feeling like I was the only one who felt like punching my husband if he asked me if I was ok one more time. ;) After reading some of the comments...I feel as if I am not alone.

I love it! I'd love to add another body part to the removable panel: the dried up ovaries that she forgot about when she was completing her masters and now will have to hope to God that they still may still have an ounce of usable life-producing ability in them before the cease to function anymore.

Wow. How about a Grad School Ken? Comes with 3 days of facial hair growth, receding hairline, pot belly, holes in tennis shoes, backpack hunch, fridge stocked with beer, pretzels, cheese w/ mold, and empty Chinese food containers. But maybe he needs to be Ken's buddy, Grad School Joe. Ken would never have the pot belly. And the things that come out of his mouth are not appropriate for publication. Needed this laugh!

That is hilarious! My sister found your post and shared it with me because she knew I could relate -- I just finished my doctorate this spring and have a few friends (surprising, I know, with the craziness of grad school) who are finishing theirs, so this was quite timely. Thanks for the laugh! And congratulations on finishing your grad degree!

I got an MBA while working full time with a kid in high school. (and an MBA has 57-60 credits while a "regular" masters is usually only 30). Anyone who feels stress about ONLY having to go to grad school is a whiner and a slacker.

Grad school is indentured servitude. I will never understand why i paid $45,000 to take 15 "internship credits" where I didn't get paid, and spent 20 hrs/week for 2 semesters working for other people. Who ever heard of paying to work? That's worse than welfare. And if I had an opinion about what I was doing, it was seen poorly by the professors. Even more shocking, those poor people who pay to get Social Work masters (among others), make very little once they graduate. Unless it is a preprofessional program or you plan on being a professor, grad school scams students and is highly over rated.

Loved this, graduated with Master Degree at 50 and somehow resembled Graduate School Barbie (TM)". Went on to get additional license which made Negative Nancy furious since I shared a cubicle with her, ouch! and her second degree came with a "me too demand!" without doing any course work. What school would do that? So jealousy prevailed and bullying continued. May I suggest it had been a life long pattern? Loved Barbie!

I am in my 3rd year of a 3 year graduate program. My committee chair showed me this link. HILARIOUS! I've reread it several times this week just to remind myself WE ARE NOT ALONE! haha excellent! encouraging one graduate student at a time...

I am in my 3rd year of a 3 year graduate program. My committee chair showed me this link. HILARIOUS! I've reread it several times this week just to remind myself WE ARE NOT ALONE! haha excellent! encouraging one graduate student at a time...

Single mother of four here, in my 40's, in my first semester of a 60 credit masters. Very stressful, as I am never adequate in caring for my children's many and diverse needs, as a finance', as a daughter of aging parents, as a friend or as a student.However, I have to say it's nothing compared to my days as "just a mom" of 4 kids, dealing with an extremely complex and stressful set of special needs in one, homeschooling, and doing a little paid work here and there. Non-stop, 18+-hour days, my life subsumed for everyone else. And, in that role, I was devalued and talked down to as an idiot. So, it's nice to at least be recognized as having a brain, and working hard, at least as a student! That little "4 kids" thing still doesn't seem to register with people as anything much somehow! "Four kids" seems to register in people's understanding as something like, "sweet little hobby I can participate in when I feel like it," or, "I have pets." Sigh. Clueless. May need to just start saying I also work full-time (for no pay) on top of school?

About us

After being crazy in love for a decade, we officially became a family on May 23, 2009. We are thrilled to be married and enjoying this exciting time in our lives! Ceej worked as a Journeyman plumber and is now bidding jobs for a local plumbing company, and Em graduated from UW-Madison in December of 2008 and is in the Masters of Occupational Therapy program at the University of Minnesota to be completed in the Fall of 2011. Our sweet baby Hazel Leann arrived April 1, 2011 (no foolin'!) and is the biggest joy and blessing we didn't know we needed. Life isn't perfect, but it sure is wonderful - We're truly enjoying every new second of God's awesome plan for our lives!
Pictures credit to Forever Photography (family/baby) and McManigal Photography (wedding).